


i cannot let you burn me up, nor can i resist you

by crystaloregarden



Series: main verse - 2011 & manga [1]
Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Reuniting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:13:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28142925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crystaloregarden/pseuds/crystaloregarden
Summary: Feitan asks to see Kortopi after obligations have kept them separate for almost two months.
Relationships: Feitan/Kortopi (Hunter X Hunter)
Series: main verse - 2011 & manga [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2113914
Kudos: 1





	i cannot let you burn me up, nor can i resist you

“How close are you to Landport?”

Feitan’s voice sounded tinny from the poor reception Kortopi was getting to his phone. He’d just arrived here after traveling from several states over and was now ducked underneath the overhang of a shop that was closed for the night, fighing off exhaustion. A thrill ran through his veins that woke him slightly, realizing his partner was actually fairly close to where he was.

“I’m several cities over, but a train is about to run that would take me there in about an hour and a half. Are you busy?”

There was a pause, followed by the sound of someone’s artery being sliced and a limp body hitting the floor. Kortopi raised his eyebrow beneath a curtan of obscuring silver. 

“Not anymore.”

———

_”Meet me at cliffs outside of city, to the left of the interstate highway.”_

Even with such a vague locational point, it wasn’t particularly difficult to locate Feitan when he wasn’t suppressing his presence using _In _— the Spiders knew eachother’s aura like the back of their hands, and Kortopi knew that Fei’s was strong enough to frighten most people away even if they could protect it. Traversing a series of steep, rocky inclines, he he eventually located his partner standing on the top of one, overlooking an expanse of nothingness with the moon overhead, his hands in his pockets.__

__“Took you too long.” He said, without looking back. Kortopi simply hummed, undeterred, making his way to Fei’s side and immediately flopping down a few feet away, holding himself up to a sitting position by his hands laid flat on the smooth surface of rock._ _

__“I can’t remember the last time I slept, so navigating this area was quite a difficult task.” He turned to look at Fei, staring up at him and hungrily taking in the sight of him after having been away for so long. “Not that I minded all too much.”_ _

__As the air between them fell silent, Kortopi continued to gaze at Feitan, his face unreadable as usual from the shadows cast across his face. Such an intense stare might’ve unnerved anyone else, but Feitan was impenetrable—not without any personal annoyances, but he was benign enough about them that Kortopi was willing to risk his ire. Spiders don’t fight, and Kortopi had no problem backing off at the first sign of Feitan’s discomfort in the first place._ _

__The silence had stretched on long enough to where Kortopi had assumed Feitan would simply let it slide this time, but the other Spider surprised him by asking him a question in his quiet, stilted voice; “Why you always stare at me?”_ _

__There wasn’t a hint of accusation in his voice. Kortopi tilted his head, a sea of silver hair bobbing with the movement._ _

__“Well, I like looking at you.”_ _

__Feitan exhaled a sharp, nearly inaudible puff of laughter into the neck of his cloak, and Kortopi’s chest erupted into a sea of pleasant butterflies. For a moment, he thought he might melt with adoration._ _

__“For you, it is okay.” Feitan admitted plainly, continuing to hold his gaze with the middle distance. “Anyone else, it makes me sick.”_ _

__Kortopi nodded. “That’s okay.” And it was, because every time Feitan looked at him, he swore he became the clumsiest person in the world, his heart becoming a cage in which a thousand noisy birds resided and clambored for freedom. So it really was okay, and perhaps as a result of this effortless acceptance, Feitan finally turned to look at him, the bridge of his nose lacking its usual wrinkles of distaste or intense focus._ _

__Kortopi’s mouth attempted a series of noises, none of which managed to form any words. His partner’s wine-red eyes went perfectly with the light of the moon, which made them look like polished obsidian. Feitan raised an eyebrow, lightly bemused as he fumbled his attempts to speak of their beauty._ _

__“You look beautiful tonight.” Is what he eventually settled on, and Feitan had the audacity to look mildly stunned, as if anything out of Kortopi’s mouth tonight _wasn’t_ going to be singing his absolute praises. They hadn’t seen eachother in about a month and a half, now, temporarily forced apart by various jobs and a bout of wanderlust on Kortopi’s part that had lead him almost halfway across the continent — sue him for getting a touch sentimental about seeing someone he’d held affections for since he’d joined the Troupe a handful of years ago._ _

__Feitan let Kortopi compose himself once again, appearing to be waiting on him to speak something he could actually respond to._ _

__“Can I hold your hand?”_ _

__Feitan hummed, appearing to have significantly less trouble processing that request as Kortopi himself, who was blushing so hard that it turned his pale skin a dark enough red to make out even through the shadows of his hair. There was a bit of a pause, enough for Kortopi to begin to pre-emptively prepare to be let down, but then—_ _

__“Hmph. Cute.”_ _

__In a few simple motions, Feitan had sat down to Kortopi’s side, letting his legs splay out underneath himself and gathering the younger Spider in his arms. Gently, as if the slightest bit of pressure might break him, or perhaps as if he had no actual idea how to hug. The angle was slightly awkward, so once Kortopi’s soul had returned to his body, he had to shuffle forward a bit so that his head could rest on Feitan’s shoulder. All it took was a brief maneuvering of his arms folding against Feitan’s chest for him to be fully comfortable, and the comfort was so potent that Kortopi nearly dozed off the instant he let the other Spider’s presence envelop him._ _

__Feitan inhaled and exhaled on a long breath of similar relaxation, an action that Kortopi physically _felt_ beneath his hands as his ribcage expanded, and he had to fight the urge to nuzzle happily into his chest, enthralled at the feeling of closeness. A few breathless chuckles left him in exchange, shoulders shaking against Feitan’s embrace._ _

__“This is even better.”_ _

__Feitan hummed again, pressing his face into the side of Kortopi’s head, and Kortopi nearly leapt out of his skin at the vibrations of his voice against his skull, so close to his ear. “I know what you like.”_ _

__Kortopi buried his face into Feitan’s chest, too embarrassed to speak. He felt Feitan laugh again, and this time his own face lit up beneath the cover of his hair, smiling so wide that his cheeks hurt._ _

__“You make it sound like you’re just humoring me, but you’re the one who arranges these meetups in the first place.”_ _

__Feitan said nothing to this accusation at first, simply leaning back and cradling Kortopi further against his chest. Nearly a full minute had passed by the time he had provided his response, startling Kortopi out of a second bout of nearly falling asleep._ _

__“You are special. You say only what you mean, so it easier to do only what I want, too. There are no mind games needed to understand.”_ _

__The smaller Spider pondered that for a moment, running it through a few times in his hand to make sure he understood. “I find you to be rather straightforward as well, after getting to know you. It seemed like it would be difficult at first, but,” Kortopi returned the gesture given to him earlier, pressing his cheek into thick locks of black hair. “You have a set of tells for anyone who cares to look for them. Shal and Phinks know them too, I can tell.”_ _

__“Yes,” Feitan conceded, idly playing with the tips of Kortopi’s hair. “I’ve known them for nine years… six months.” Fingers released the silver strands, resting at the small of his back, instead. “You, for four years, seven months.”_ _

__Kortopi closed his eyes, allowing a small sea of memories to be stirred up. He’d been nothing but a traitor of Meteor City, abandoning its motto of “—take nothing from us” in order to steal and hoard what little treasure its natives had, curating his Conjuration abilities purely to the end of selfish gain. He’d pulled off countless robberies without leaving so much as a trace behind, leading to a mass panic when people’s things started rapidly disappearing for the weeks on end following the mastery of his Gallery Fake technique. He wasn’t _so_ young as to be totally unaware of who the Troupe were, but he’d been too selfish and antisocial at the time to care too much when he’d overheard that the Council had asked the Troupe to track down this thief who would be so heinous to steal from a place that already had nothing. _ _

__He remembered his shock when a clever trap had been set for him using Nen, and when he was apprehended by a woman with wild pink hair and brought to their leader — his surprise when this had turned out to be _the_ Troupe, and they were just a group of bandits just like him, similar to him in age and cynical, world-weary philosophy — the _trust_ he felt in hearing Chrollo’s proposal to him, unparallelled by any feeling he’d ever had for someone, that made him almost immediately accept. Some notable first impressions — that bubbly blonde who made him feel like he was where he had always belonged to begin with, that quiet tribesman who was more than happy to share comfortable silences and kind wisdoms… and most of all, a trickling of his first interactions with Feitan, whom the entire group joked about being his kindred spirit, as both of them were unreadable with their stone-like indifference and few spoken words. They’d been drawn to eachother from the start, hadn’t they?—with Feitan’s raw emotions bleeding out from the sides like a lidded candle-flame and Kortopi’s crystalized, like ice, unwavering. He supposed fire and frost both felt like burning to an outsider’s skin._ _

__Gratefulness took him under like a wave, finally blurring his consciousness with pure contentment to the point where he no longer attempted to fight it, going relaxed and limp in Feitan’s arms._ _

__“I’m very grateful to Danchou, and to you. To the whole Spider.”_ _

__He could feel Feitan shift his body as he floated away, sliding him slightly down and then feeling a chin rest atop his head, his next words ringing light vibrations through his skull as a result._ _

__“Me too. Sleep well, _yintian_. I will keep us safe this night.”_ _

__“Okay. Good night, Fei.”_ _

__That night, the Spider slept with two of its legs entwined._ _

**Author's Note:**

> fic title is a quote from A.S. Byatt, and "yintian" means "cloudy/overcast" (as a reference to 'topi's silver hair) - i just thought the trend in feiphinks fics of feitan calling phinks "baichi" as a nickname was so cute and adopted something similar for my own pair! i'm really hoping that word doesn't have multiple meanings because i did not check and i will die of embarrassment if so-
> 
> SOOOO i have roughly a dozen fic WIPs for this pair sitting in my folder, an on a whim i found this one, which is now 5 months old and pretty outdated in terms of how i currently write them, but i figured it was just going to sit there forever if i didn't push it out, so i did :> these two are my fav hxh pair currently and i've done several years of development on kortopi's character so i look forward to posting more on him & on this pair in the future! lmk if you liked it, kudos & comments are much appreciated!
> 
> twt is @crystaloregrove, come say hi!


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